Category talk:Monsters
Ok, guys, let's get this thing rolling. There's a lot of data that could be here that isn't, so let's crowdsource some magic here. Let's figure out what is appropriate to capture in order to make this page more useful for deciding which monsters to try to obtain. I suspect some sort of nested tables would be ideal for displaying these -- I'll try to come out with a sane layout. Also, we should convert all monster names (except crossbreed parentheticals, perhaps) to links to individual monster pages so we can get started on those. Here are what I feel should be on this list and in the monster pages. Monster List *Monster name *Starting stats *Training Confidence (I don't think these are constant, actually, as I am pretty sure I have seen different disc-generated Gadgeters have varying defense confidence. If that's right, it might or might not be worth trying to figure out the degree of variation, and whether crossbreeding can also affect these. Also, this should probably be rated 1-10 as shown on the monster info pages, instead of the 1-5 on the *Food loves/hates *Maximum Age *General Notes -- A short blurb that calls out anything interesting about the monster. In most cases this will probably apply to all monsters of the species. *What else? Monster Pages *Everything in the above list *Monster name *Description *Picture *Crossbreeds *Abilities (Level 3, 7, 12, and adventure rewards) *Hidden variables? The monster description texts hint very strongly that there are other hidden variables at work, although I'm not sure if this actually points to hidden variables or if it's just writing content. Some monsters do seem to train differently, though -- for example, seems to hit Amazing more often, but only has relatively high confidence in two stats. **Training biases -- do some monsters hit Amazing more often than others, or is that just me? Are these stat-specific? **Genetic Biases -- Some monsters have a 50% chance to spawn when crossbred against certain other monsters, but other combinations give a more asymmetrical result. Is this predictable and expressable in some understandable short form? Maybe there are genetic groups, where all monsters in Group X will have a 50% chance to spawn either monster when crossbred against any other monster in that group. Not sure yet. TheUmopepisdn 10:41, March 4, 2012 (UTC) ...so, maybe something like this... | |- | Love: Veggies Hate: Meat |- | | |- | | |} This needs some work... Hi, First off, thanks for coming by! :D Iif we're putting all that on the individual monster pages, it would probably make sense to keep the actual monster list as just a list with links to each page. I think a page for each monster family with common attributes (for example, I have noticed that techniques seem to be shared among all members of that family) would also be a good idea. The main reason I haven't split them off yet is that I'm the only one that's been editing so far - I've been fleshing everything out as I have time and energy. I can pull off the wiki information for a great number of species, but I've only raised a handful and so there would be a LOT of holes based on just what I know. Unfortunately there are no real sources of information for this game that I've found, so I've been filling in what I've been able to discern. On age limits: I think this might be a family-specific stat rather than a species-specific stat (for example, I've noticed the couple of different Golems I've raised all hit their adulthood late and age long, whereas all Pixies seem to hit it very quickly and usually don't make it to 3 years.) This would be a very useful stat, if we can figure out the patterns.... I can also look into making a template page for each monster species. Tiakall 16:39, March 4, 2012 (UTC) Thanks for the warm welcome! :) I agree strongly that there would be a lot of holes in the data -- that's one reason I feel the template is necessary. There's no way either one of us could hope to fill it in; training takes too long and there is too much chance in crossbreeding. No, this data needs to be crowdsourced, and I don't think that can happen effectively until a framework is available to collect the right data. I know what it is I want to know when I'm trying to decide what monster to train up as a mate for my sixth generation golem, so that seemed like a reasonable starting page. I am divided on whether it should be on the main list page. On one hand, data duplication is no great crime, and I really feel that a list that supports quickly finding a monster with the approprite confidence levels (and which you can obtain) is absolutely critical to playing an efficient and effective game. On the other hand, putting all that right on the main page promises to make it very bulky, so maybe the best idea is to create a completely separate page that has the breakdowns in a set of easily comparable tables. The problem with that is that it might not be as easy to find, and I think a nice empty space begging to be filled in is going to be the best possible bait for new contributors. . I'm happy to go with your preference if you've a strong one, I do feel like that data has much greater value if it's in an easily-scanned form, though, and feel obligated to find somewhere to give people to collect it. Scanning through my wiki's training history, I agree that maximum age seems to be a genetic trait. My golem list is telling: my oldest purebreed lived to 3y6m, and all of the crossbreeds are younger (most 3y1m). Let me know what you think! As you say, there's almost nothing out there on this game, and I think that your efforts will start to snowball any day now. And guess what; they have: your first flake has arrived. :) . TheUmopepisdn 08:25, March 6, 2012 (UTC) I think having page(s) with a full table of training confidences and keeping the monster page (which is actually just a category page, I just haven't added anything TO the category) as a simple list would be best. I'm also thinking 1 row/6 column tables (horizontal) would scan better to the eye than the more vertical ones. You do have a point about the holes being good bait - that's sort of how I ended up here. Heh. I'll see if I can rig up a starter template page so we can tweak at it. I think the Amazing! might be reliant on training, actually - I don't recall where I read it, but 'spoiled' monsters (those that are praised more and scolded less) supposedly have a bigger chance for both fails and amazings. (Not that I've seen much fail at all beyond infancy.) Tiakall 22:57, March 6, 2012 (UTC) I added ExampleMonsterEntry since templating doesn't seem easy to edit and the layout builder is apparently super-broken. Unless you think it needs any tweaking, we can probably go ahead and use this. Would a "template" for family pages be beneficial or should I just go ahead and make an actual page as a sample? Tiakall 00:48, March 7, 2012 (UTC) Computer died. :( I'm back now. I think monster that either monster life span has some random to it or there is some other x-factor (e.g., battles may shorten the monster's life based on how much energy it has). I think this because I used three Nutcho discs at the same time, and one of them retired two months before the others. TheUmopepisdn 16:46, March 11, 2012 (UTC) And I'd say at this point, a sample page would be a good place to start. It'd be nice to get the format right before too many entries go in but a place to put the data seems more important for now. I code a bit so I may play around with templates and see if I can get them to work. TheUmopepisdn 17:06, March 11, 2012 (UTC) Ok, for this stat list page, it seems like the important information when selecting a monster to generate for its stats: 1. Training confidences 2. Food preferences 3. Life span (estimated from first generation parents from disc) 4. ??? Hidden variables ??? Lots of monster texts hint that some monsters may be inherently better trainers. Rare monsters usually train unusually well, and monsters like plant and ogyo always seem slow for me. Does that mean some monsters are affected more by spartan/sweet/etc training disposition? Do some get a trust bonus? Do some just start from a higher baseline? a. Does six stars' confidence on monster a always equate to the same on monster b? Or is it normalized against some other axis? Just don't know. Anyway, the age seems not-that-important and too variable to keep track of. It seems conceivable people might want to see the food preferences in line with the stats. This might be best as a background color on the cel of the stat potentially affected by food preference. maybe this is appropriate formatting: Hmm... wish I could get it to let me adjust widths and heights. That takes up too much space... 01:31, March 12, 2012 (UTC) |} On the hidden variables - There's potentially quite a lot at work here, but I don't think we have enough information to determine what is going on. For example, rare monsters might be more prone to Amazing!; I'm having a Pandibaku that seems to run into them a lot. On the other hand, I've had a plain old Golem that was equally lucky whereas my Gadgeter Z was not. At any rate, theories and formulas would be difficult to put into a table, but if we do figure things out, it would be worthwhile for the Monsters page or the individual monster pages, depending on where it applies. Short of kidnapping a TK employee or someone poking through the code, I'm not sure we'll be able to draw enough data for any conclusions on monster stats. Having said that, if we see quantifiable trends, by all means, we should add them. I do like the idea of color-coding the food preferences. I think two pages once we get some stats compiled would be best - one for starting stats (for mystery disk/blank disk generation) and one for confidences (for combining/people that don't care about starting stats as much). Tiakall 02:56, March 13, 2012 (UTC) You raise some good points. There are too many unknowns. It's hard to know what data to use. I am almost level 50 and I can't really tell if my breeding methods are optimal. Maybe this wiki needs a 'Research' page, structured in the form of questions we want to ask and maybe experiments that can be run that will provide answers. I would love to know if breeding some monsters against themselves occasionally produces a rare of that breed, but can't hope to run exhaustive experiments myself. Maybe we can get people to join and contribute to this stuff by putting TinyURL-style links in our monster names. I have quite a few daily petters and some of them seem to be pretty hardcore players and I'd love to reap the benefit of their experience. Also, I think some of the other FAQs on Monster Rancher out there might have some interesting clues. For example, the (I think) Monster Rancher DS FAQ calls out that some monsters breed better with certain monsters than others, and that some breeds were only unlocked by breeding monsters that DIDN'T go together. The stat clearly doesn't apply here, since breeding doesn't work the same here, but the mechanic does exist in some form: different monster combinations have different percentage chances to produce with certain other monsters, and I'm not sure why. For instance, I had a second-generation Nutcho(lucky!), that when paired with most of my monsters, had only a 10% chance of becoming a third-generation Nutcho. However, when he was paired with a Dark Piercer of the 3rd generation, he had a 55% chance. I would *really* like to know how to exploit that to keep rare monsters around a few more generations, let me tell you. Anyway, glad you like the table ideas. I will poke around at it some more and hopefully get the page at least started this weekend. TheUmopepisdn 10:03, March 17, 2012 (UTC) Sorry I haven't been around recently - been ill and had some RL stuff as well. I've got some little tidbits to add and then I think I'm going to get started with some individual monster pages. Feel free to start a Research page - if at any point you think something might be a good idea, be bold and go ahead and add it :) I do have at least one rare frozen and I'm going to freeze my Pandibaku once it's ready to retire as well, so feel free to experiment with both of them on rare breeding. 19:03, April 1, 2012 (UTC)